Carry cost
The five-year premium penalty of one claim, priced, against the repair you would otherwise absorb.
Absorb before filing
Computed
The loss
What a contractor would charge. Not the adjuster's number yet.
Water and liability claims are underwritten harder than wind.
A roof at 15 years raises the non-renewal weight.
The policy
The renewal increase plus the claims-free discount you lose.
The state FAIR plan or surplus premium if the policy is non-renewed.
Discount rate for the five-year penalty.
Where this loss sits
The black line is the loss you are pricing at $6,500. The tick is the central ceiling, $7,801.
The five-year arithmetic
Base 6% wind or hail, 18% interior water, 25% fire or liability. Add 35 points per prior claim and 15 for a roof at 15 years or older. These are modelling assumptions, not carrier rate filings.
The ceiling is returned as a range because that probability is the soft number in the model. If your loss sits inside the range, the decision is genuinely close and the cash-flow question — can you pay it without borrowing — should decide it.
An inquiry can be recorded even when nothing is paid. If you are not going to file, do not open a claim to ask.
Carrier underwriting rules differ by state and by insurer. This prices the tradeoff, not the policy.
A single claim can raise a premium by a third and hold it there for five years. On a small loss the premium penalty usually exceeds the payout. Only the arithmetic can tell you where the line sits, and the line moves with your deductible and claims history.
The soft number in this model is the probability of non-renewal, not the surcharge. Rather than print an invented percentage with two significant figures, the engine returns the ceiling at ±50% on that probability. If your loss sits inside the range, the decision is genuinely close.
Insurance records can capture an enquiry even when nothing is paid out. If you have decided to absorb the cost, do not open a claim to ask a question.
payout = repair quote − deductible
NPV penalty = (1 − p) × surcharge PV + p × non-renewal PV
ceiling = deductible + expected penalty
verdict = self-pay ≤ ceiling < borderline < file
Premium surcharges, non-renewal behaviour and last-resort pricing are set by insurers and states, not by this page. The probabilities are named assumptions, banded on the page, and editable in the model.